The Role of HR

Empowering the employee experience

LEADING CHANGE AT WORK:

The role of HR in driving the digital workplace

SME Executive Summary

A Word From Our Moderator

Introduction

Challenges to Change

Polarising Views

Policy and Governance: Who owns it?

Conclusion & Recommendations

SME Executive Summary

By Rebekah Wallis, People & Corporate Responsibility Director at Ricoh UK

The pandemic redefined the importance of HR in every organisation. We’ve been on a steep learning curve to not only safeguard the health and well-being of our workforces, but the quick adaptation to remote working, changing government guidelines, vaccine rollouts and more recently staff and skills shortages.

HR has been through the test of a lifetime, and it’s far from over. Recent research from Adecco Group revealed that the UK was the only country which reported higher levels of anxiety about going back into the office (52%) than excitement at seeing colleagues (48%). Whilst we have established COVID processes, the wider implications on employee well-being continue to be felt.

This report comes following our HR roundtable, which brought several different perspectives together. We have conducted, what we are calling a definitive discussion of how we can lead change at work. This report will provide recommendations for senior leaders proposed by the very teams they manage.

Rebekah Wallis,
People & Corporate Responsibility Director
Ricoh UK

A Word from Our Moderator – Paul Mason

HR has a unique economic challenge on its hands. We are tackling a new polarisation of view that has not existed before. Now, within nearly every organisation, there are two informal ‘subcultures’ fighting it out for dominance.

Firstly, the cohort who have settled into the work from home environment and feel strongly about not being forced back into an office environment. I believe that this group has seen tangible benefits from this new environment but similarly may not recognise or remember the value of collaborative working (even if it is only a few times a week).

Secondly, we have the cohort who want to be in the physical workplace, this group who are generally younger, are crying out for a separation from work and home life. But they, too, have recognised the flexibility of WFH environments. Despite a clear desire to return, they will do so with new and improved expectations on how workplaces should look and operate.

The challenge for HR is: how do we measure, understand and define the optimum mix and create a culture that supports hybrid working. My biggest takeaway from the time spent with this group was that CEOs and business leaders are not giving HR managers and directors the space or clarity of direction to embrace this new challenge.

Paul Mason,
Journalist, writer and film-maker

Introduction

In organising this series of roundtables, we hoped to understand the specific ways businesses have been impacted, looking at the different departments and speaking with leaders from across industries. For this report, we spoke with HR professionals to find out how HR is navigating the impacts of the pandemic, including key processes relating to COVID, as well to find out how HR leads are dealing with external pressures such as staff shortages.

What was made apparent by all the HR professionals was that HR has sat at the heart of the pandemic storm, managing employee and business needs alike, all of which has increased the HR team’s voice and credibility with business leaders. We found that HR teams have had an unparalleled set of challenges, which has increased HR’s function and responsibilities giving them a front seat in the productivity conversation.

According to the professionals we met and spoke with, the biggest issues facing business right now centre around staff shortages, employee retention and recruitment. It was their firm belief that more training is needed to ensure employee security and well-being.

Distilling the information, experience and knowledge gathered, the following report has been split into three key themes: “Challenges to Change”, “Polarising Views”, “Policy and Governance: Who Owns It?”.

We hope that this report will act as a guide to help businesses leaders support HR teams across the UK in developing a stable, productive and happy workforce. As such we have also collated a series of recommendations for CEOs and senior leaders to support HR managers in leading change at work.

Section 1: Challenges to Change

HR teams across the country have sat in the eye of a global business storm, acting as an intermediary point for all, from supporting employee well-being to managing overnight reforms and business policy changes. No matter what challenge has come our way, your HR lead has found themselves in a difficult but vital position.

MANAGING THE IMPOSSIBLE

Perhaps the biggest challenge faced has been managing employee well-being. Work/life balance has been at the top of every HR agenda. Where once the confines of an office acted as the boundary to HRs remit, the pandemic has blended the personal and professional.

The need for greater wellbeing practices has been an on-going issue in the pandemic. Our Conscious Workplace report found that nearly 1/3 of employees were finding health and well-being a challenge. As one roundtable participant said, “We’ve had people dealing with very big challenges with their mental health, and it’s been on us to navigate this.”

The mental health crisis was something nearly all attendees were actively working on or had supported over the past two years. For many, mental health and employee well-being was the main reason for people either wanting, or not wanting, to return to the office. In the end, it was often up to HR to figure out the best approach to appease both groups.

POLAR-OPPOSITES

The role of mental health in deciding how people would return to the office signifies the second biggest challenge facing HR; polarisation.

As one of the roundtable participants said, “There is such a polarisation of view. It is tricky to get people to test before they come into the office - some people believe it’s a violation of their human rights and some are very nervous of interacting face to face. So, all the time, you’re working with this polarity of opinion, making it incredibly difficult to develop a plan that will keep everyone happy, healthy, safe and productive.”

This polarised view was echoed in the wider group. The roundtable highlighted that businesses must listen and lead the conversation to create a successful return to office strategy. Senior leaders should be tapping into the HR team’s expertise and insight and use this as a consideration, rather than a deciding factor, as there is unlikely to be a solution to suit both groups.

KEEPING STAFF HAPPY VS KEEPING STAFF

This polarisation of views bleeds into the third and final major challenge faced by the HR lead: staff shortages, retention, and recruitment.

With staff and talent shortages dominating many sectors, it can be easy for senior leaders to fall into the trap of trying to appease all employees – but as explained above, this isn’t possible. Instead, our roundtable found that one of the biggest things businesses should be doing, according to HR, is focusing on training.

Our HR professionals felt that training was needed first to ensure all employees could work, whatever their location and that the training to effectively use tools was fundamental. And secondly, that training should be used to up-skill existing talent to ensure their future in the business is secure.

According to Elizabeth East, Senior HR Business Partner at WJEC, whose company has been using training to improve digital skills across the board, it’s important to upscale and to bring employees on your digital journey, but it also helps attract new talent. Elizabeth said:

“Ensure training is a part of the recruitment and applicant process, so we can ensure they have the needed basic digital skills.”

Essentially demonstrating that the talent market is also interested in working for businesses looking to invest in them, not just financially but professionally, by ensuring they have the skills needed to succeed.

Section 2: Polarising Views

Over the past 18 months, HR has had a monumental role in safeguarding employee well-being and the protection of a healthy work/life balance. To do this they have had to reconcile the needs of managers and workers; deliver policies which support a divided workforce split into those in favour of a return to the office and those who don’t and supporting employees affected by mental instability or further domestic problems.

MANAGING THE IMPOSSIBLE

MISALIGNED POWER

Despite the complexity and diversity of these challenges, all of the HR leads we spoke with shared that on the whole employees and businesses were uncollaborative when it came to making decisions. Often, they felt that crucial final decisions were resting solely on their shoulders.

At the same time, working from home has conferred more power to employees, who felt entitled to assert their thoughts and preferences.

One roundtable participant put it “not everybody wants to be at work every day, they've found benefits in being at home. And often find they can be really productive in that environment.”

The typical power dynamics of the workforce have been disrupted. Where once, decisions on how employees worked were dictated from above, they are now being demanded from below and in both situations, HR is sat firmly at the crossroads.

AVOIDING BURNOUT

There are two issues sitting at the heart of this polarised view, the first is physical safety and the second is the fear of burnout.

Elizabeth East from WJEC stressed: “If you're focused on results only and have your people working from home, but then you find 30% of the workforce are logging on at 10 -11 p.m.

Is there an issue there? How do you prevent burnout? There’s a fine line, and I think businesses need to ensure they offer flexibility. And to do so effectively, they need to think about having policies and processes in place to ensure that people are looking after their wellbeing”.

It is the role of flexibility and the need to set up practices and policies around it which our HR leads felt was most likely to ensure success for both groups; those who want to stay at home and those who want to stay in the office.

Section 3: Policy and Governance: Who owns it?

Policies underwent significant change and had a deep impact on recruitment and HR processes. Companies tried to meet workers' needs, becoming more flexible and giving more independence to employees with varied outcomes. But the real issue, according to the session attendees, is the ownership of policies and governance, especially in the current climate.

FLEXIBILITY COMES FROM THE TOP

More empowered employees impact leadership processes, whether around people's contracts or the actual workplace itself. Flexibility is needed to apply a recruitment policy, for example, to align with times that respect employee needs. At the same time, guidelines from CEOs and managers are essential to answer important questions such as: “What's the culture like here?”, “What is a typical working week like?”, “How will I work?”.

As a matter of fact, according to the attendee Elizabeth East from WJEC, when it comes to recruitment “In order for businesses to be successful they need to look at policies and processes. Many organisations now are becoming so much more flexible, which is what people want, it’s what candidates want. People will be looking for that balance, and for some it will have more importance than salary.”

Essentially, decisions around flexibility need to come from those who set the culture. It is necessary that senior leaders set the parameters needed to ensure successful processes and policies can be developed.

A BENCHMARK FOR TALENT

The talent shortages we’ve all read about in the news have been felt by HR teams across the country and as claimed by Ricoh’s own Lena Russell, HR teams are “Struggling from a candidate perspective to match talent to the business needs - the speed of change in the marketplace is just really, really difficult”.

In this regard, despite the recent action calls from the British government to “go back to work”, as underlined by Caroline Roberts, HR Director at CBI:

“There are external factors, there is rampant inflation for instance. Whether it's your shopping bill or buying white goods, there has been a 20% rise in the last three months on some frequently purchased items, and wages aren't going up. So, people are saying: ‘well, I really can't afford to come into the office now.’”

For those living further away from their office, asking them to make the drive to work during the recent fuel crisis was like asking them to choose work over life – the office over the supermarket or their children’s school – rather than ensuring a balance between the two is struck.

According to HR, at the moment, what we are lacking is clear direction. Employees are not looking for random statements, but rather for guidelines, in terms of recruitment policies and value propositions. This should not negatively affect the culture of the company, but it should create an organisational infrastructure that aims at a unified workforce.

Conclusions & Recommendations

1. Leadership: Metrics are needed to address employee culture

The concept of hybrid working is built on the premise of balance and understanding as well as the right blend of people, process, workspace and technology. However, our rapid adoption of hybrid work during the pandemic has seen the different subcultures discussed in this report battle it out for dominance - this is not hybrid work in practice.

For businesses to fully reap the benefits of a hybrid workplace, HR must work to provide metrics that measure benefits and reveal the pitfalls of different working practices and the technology/processes that support them. Only through this approach can we move away from assumptions and lead effective change to hybrid working.

2. Analysis: HR needs to leverage digital to meet employee expectations

The recurring discussion of skills and staff shortages demonstrated a clear pain point for all businesses we spoke with. Employee retention is also key to ensuring continuity and productivity. Whilst culture sits paramount, HR needs to look at how digital can enhance culture to meet rising employee expectations. HR has the power to leverage technologies that change employee experiences, such as smart booking systems, meeting room technologies, remote digital workflows, etc, that ultimately make the workplace a destination of choice. HR must lead in making the business case for the office and for the digital solutions that make the environment more desirable.

3. Understanding: Build partnerships with other disciplines to lead change at work

HR has felt the weight of the pandemic more than many industries. The nuances of managing employee health and safety throughout this period has been emotionally and physically taxing on our industry leaders and employees. But, this does not have to continue to be the case, other disciplines and personas we spoke to through this process are experiencing similar challenges that can be addressed through collaboration. For example, training. A key necessity cited in all roundtables, is a very human process and can be led by HR with the support of the IT, FM and Operations leaders who understand what the training should address.

Businesses can adopt many critical solutions to enable these recommendations. From the use of smart lockers which allow for contactless distribution of asset management, allowing safety and collaboration to come into play. To the use of business process and automation, which enables HR teams to work in partnership with others, with little hindrance to productivity and company culture.